Of Waves and Degrees
Installation with 65” flat screen, slide projector, slide, photographic filters, motor
2020
[video and images of the installation with different videos running in the flat screen]
[Eng]
Of Waves and Degrees is a video installation composed of a flat screen arranged on the floor, onto which a slide projector projects its beam that passes through photographic filters (hung from the ceiling) in motion. The piece reflects directly on the current climate crisis with respect to global warming and the consequent rise in sea level. We are in a very delicate moment, with catastrophic forecasts at many levels, and the first direct indicator of the rise in temperatures is the rise in sea level. The Earth has already gone through a period in which with up to a maximum of four degrees on average higher than today, the sea level became up to 20 meters higher, so we know perfectly what awaits us. Today, large masses of the population live in coastal areas, meaning that rising sea levels will affect millions of people and cause a large wave of refugees who will migrate to other areas (which will also be affected in other ways). One of the problems of the climate crisis is its perception, in terms of data and reality itself. We watch televised events and a torrent of data from which we feel estranged. This filtered perception and layered construction is what the installation with photographic filters refers to, which are based on videos of sunsets in the sea (in areas that will be affected very soon) or of the sun reflected on the surface of a river (many rivers are drying up with increasingly long periods of drought). The movement of the filters can be understood as our rotational movement around the Sun, in a complex system of dependence, as well as a clock, which makes us aware of the (little) time we have. Of Waves and Degrees is conceived as an individual piece, but also as a system with several of them, with different videos on the screens and different combinations of photographic filters, occupying an entire space and bathing it with the lighting effects they generate.